


Dangerous Little Hope

by ReminiscentLullaby



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Anxiety Attacks, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Post-Episode: s03e08 The Battle of Starcourt, Post-Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-17 12:01:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29099961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReminiscentLullaby/pseuds/ReminiscentLullaby
Summary: A rough day for the Byers culminates in a revelation about Hopper that Joyce isn't ready to believe in.
Relationships: Joyce Byers & Eleven | Jane Hopper, Joyce Byers/Jim "Chief" Hopper
Comments: 10
Kudos: 22





	Dangerous Little Hope

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first ever Stranger Things fic! Joyce Byers and Jopper have recently taken over my entire heart and soul. I hope you all enjoy.

Joyce Byers can feel everybody around her. They impress like bends in space curving her direction, invisible warps in this plane, as if she is a force of gravity strong enough to urge them inward. That her head feels like it has been filled with cement and throbs beneath the droning voice of the man speaking to her now serves to enhance the effect, to make her wonder if she is a black hole about to swallow the burdens of the whole room. In reality, it is only that she knows these people well; she knows where this came from, and she knows where it's going, and she knows what everyone is thinking now.

Behind her, standing with his backpack draped over one shoulder, Will Byers stares at the back of his mother's head. More than Joyce senses the weight of his stare, she can hear the words he'll be sure to speak the moment he has the chance. His whisper of "Mom?" reaches back through time to echo through one of the many busy corners of her head, as she imagines him reaching for her hand once the door shuts behind them on their way out of here. "Are you okay? I'm sorry about – everything." _I'm sorry_ , but _he_ has done nothing wrong. It isn't about an apology, though, it's about knowing how to care for people in pain, and over the years, Will has sharpened this skill, learning from instinct and example alike.

She has seen it in the way he treats Eleven, the girl sitting in the seat to Joyce's left now. Her fingers are curled into fists atop her knees, expression set rigid as stone while she glares hotly at the space between her feet and the principal's desk. Will seemed indifferent towards her in the past, perhaps even a little resentful, but after this last summer, his compassionate nature has surfaced bright and warm, thawing his reluctant outer shell and welcoming her into a world swiftly changing for them both. Now, attending high school together, they are glued to each other's sides. They don't have anywhere else to go. And that isn't either of their faults.

It's been hard for them. It's been hard for Eleven, mostly, and Joyce feels herself being bombarded by the girl's quiet rage and helpless, ungratified chagrin. She knows El is desperate for the lecture to end, and she knows that when it is over, and the three of them are dismissed from the office, she will emit a heavy sigh as if to free the indignation she is holding back. Joyce knows the majority of it will continue to simmer in the dark of her core, too deep inside to be let out with calm and ease.

Because this is what Joyce knows El is thinking about: the power flesh and bone cannot exert, a power of the mind, something as explosive or as fine and perfect as El directs it to be at a given moment, to tear apart the face of an enemy or simply knock their foot an inch out of place. Joyce knows that is what she would have done had she been capable – send that Phillip boy who preys on Will merely tripping face-first into the lockers with the psionic tug of his shoe, rather than grab him by the hair to slam him against metal with her own two clumsy, conspicuous hands.

Joyce sees it in her mind like it's a memory of her own, and she knows the scene replays behind Eleven's dark and intense stare as she sits. They watch months of self-control giving way in a blaze of protective fury to defend her one and only friend in this town, months of grappling for the power always out of her reach these days. Joyce imagines El doesn't regret the sound of Phillip's jaw banging against the locker and the stunned look on his face as he hit the ground; she imagines it felt good to _make something happen_. It should get Phillip off of Will's back. It should _everybody_ off their backs, at least for a while. Joyce understands. She'd like to be invisible too.

Across from El and herself, the principal finally pauses his speech. Joyce is taken aback by the silence that suddenly settles over the room, blinking the thought of her eyes, feeling the way the world that had been collapsing in slowly heaves back into place.

Next, she becomes conscious of the ache in her fingers, acquired after minutes of folding her hands so tightly in her lap they tremble. Joyce relaxes some of that tension, as much as she is capable of releasing in that moment, and murmurs a sheepish, "What?"

Principal Crossley leans forward with a hardening gaze. "Mrs. Byers, Jane, I hope I make myself clear."

Having heard not a word Crossley has said in the last two minutes, Joyce nods. "Of course."

"Jane got off easy with her first infraction back in November. I didn't anticipate she would be a repeat offender. Her teachers have expressed her class engagement has steadily increased lately. We all thought she had grown out of the unacceptable behavior she exhibited earlier today."

El's brow twitches, but she doesn't look up.

"Listen," he continues, "I'm well-aware how difficult it is to adapt to a new school and a new town, but I'd hoped she would be far better adjusted so many months into the school year. She's looking at suspension if something like this ever happens again. We don't tolerate violence at this institution."

Joyce swallows roughly. "I understand."

There is the slightest hesitation, the slightest analytical tilt of Crossley's head. "Mrs. Byers, I must ask you to ensure she ceases to disrupt the learning environment for the rest of the student body."

"I will."

Her short responses must not satisfy him. If this was her first time in this office, Joyce might not have yet caught on to the fact that Crossley really likes the sound of his own voice, and ever more than that, he likes to see it echo in the reactions of whoever it is he speaks to, warping facial expressions, body languages, tones of voice. Joyce, expressive as she is by nature, tries to remain blank as smooth slate, hoping he will give up on her and let them all go. She is not sure how much more of this she can tolerate. All day, all she has wanted is to get away.

Crossley eyes her for a moment, tapping an index finger to his graying moustache before his gaze travels over Joyce's head to land on Will standing by the door. "Your son here," he goes on with a flick of his wrist, "he's a nice young man. I am certain he gets it from somewhere, yet it appears he has not had much of an influence on his – what can I call her – foster sister?"

"Sure," Joyce says through her teeth.

"I guess my concern is, Mrs. Byers, that you don't seem awfully concerned about what happened here today with Jane. You know, I only want to make sure she receives the support she needs from you in order to evolve into a respectable member of the student population."

Joyce chews on the inside of her cheek, saying nothing. Normally, jabs from strangers about her parenting would pass her by like gusts of wind – especially nowadays, when they could not possibly comprehend what she and her family have endured in the last two and a half years – but there was something about today, with all the extra weight it carried, the force of gravity that seemed to be centered within herself, that solidified his words and pressed them like a thorn between her lungs.

"We really do not take her conduct lightly. I'm going to need more than some empty assurances that you'll be on top of her behavior."

" _What_ more?" she challenges. "What more do you want me to say?"

"You don't have to say anything. I'm only hoping I'm getting through to you, Mrs. Byers."

"You're had to take me away from work, haven't you? You're through."

The corner of Crossley's mouth twitches up, and Joyce clenches her jaw, inwardly scolding herself for beginning to lose her patience. With ease, she can imagine the kind of kid Crossley had been when he was in school himself, the type of bully who acted only to get a rise out of his victims, the type of bully who El would like to throw against some lockers with dauntless ferocity. Had Joyce possessed the energy to be angry with the girl for what she did, it would have melted away with this exchange, shifting targets entirely.

Crossley folds his hands atop his desk and dips his chin at Joyce. "I'm glad to hear it. That should mean Jane won't be causing any more trouble. Am I correct?"

The question is directed at the both of them. Eleven remains as steadfastly silent as she's been from the moment Joyce entered the room. Her fingers curl over the edges of her seat, nails scraping wood.

Joyce answers, "Yes, Sir."

"Wonderful. Have a great day, Mrs. Byers. Jane. Will."

Eleven shoots to her feet before Crossley can conclude his parting words. If she had her power, she would certainly blast the door off its hinges on the way out. Instead, Will swings it wide open for her as she heaves her backpack over her shoulder, sandals clapping against the floor. Joyce rises more slowly, and she feels she must at least be partially made of stone because her body seems twice as heavy as it should. Pulse thrumming behind her skull, she offers a weak nod to Principal Crossley.

His self-satisfied smirk follows her as she turns away, sinking in, leaving its mark, like all things today.

The only thing that takes her by surprise is Will's grip on her arm, which closes softly just before they step out of the room. Her expectations are off by a few seconds only, but nonetheless, that her son does not wait until they are alone in the hallway, that he feels he must assure her of his concern before they leave Crossley's sight can only mean she is even worse off than she thinks.

Surely, he says exactly what she assumed he would. The imagined _Are you okay?_ hangs somewhere in the canopy of Joyce's tangled up thoughts, overtaking the sound of his real voice beside her ear. She doesn't hear him. Not really. But the door clicks shut, and she whispers, "I'm fine."

Somewhere amidst the nose in her head, the rest of the day unfolds like a staircase plunging towards the center of the earth. Joyce sees it all: she sees El standing by the car outside with her arms crossed and her hair dangling in front of her face when Joyce and Will finally catch up to her; she sees the construction on the main road home that prolongs what should only be a four minute drive, giving her more time to flick her gaze towards the rearview and the angry girl in the reflection; she sees the empty driveway back home and space in the garage where Jonathan's car won't be found, because he's at work; she sees the visions blurring behind a watery screen of tears Joyce couldn't cry anywhere else.

She walks toward that future. It comes first in the form of the high school parking lot beneath a sunny afternoon sky in the middle of March 1986. California. Five months since leaving Hawkins. Eight since one of the worst days of her life on the long, long list of worst days of her life. As the air hits her face, it becomes a little easier to breathe, a little harder to force her legs the rest of the way to the car.

But she makes it. And on the drive home, she senses the stare of her son on her cheek, the questions he doesn't want to press. The minutes unwind towards the moment he'll think it best to ask. (As Joyce acquires yet another sound in her head, another set of ticks in time, she wonders when she had obtained such deafening instincts; she wonders how to silence them, what it will take to finally feel nothing at all but air and earth and sun.)

In the back seat, El's disposition starts to shift. She leans additional weight into her fists, brows knitting together more forcibly than before, a defense against the emotions threatening to overtake safe, predictable anger. At the root of her grievances is a sharper and denser pain than justified wrath for a high school bully. As Joyce watches Eleven's anguish break through the surface, drawing tears to her flaming eyes, she too feels something break inside of her, the piece of her soul everything has seemed to be weighing against.

_I'm well-aware of how difficult it is to adapt to a new school and a new town._

If only it was that simple. If only doing so didn't leave their world only half upright. If only El could have made Phillip careen for the lockers with her mind instead of her hands. If only she never had to leave Hawkins in the first place.

Softly, El sobs, wiping tears with the collar of her shirt.

Joyce shouldn't stare.

She can't tear her eyes away.

They are crumbling apart in unison.

It feels even worse than it looks.

Suddenly, Will's voice cuts through. His fingers graze her shoulder. "Mom, green!"

The car accelerates a little too quickly as Joyce steps on the gas, jolted by the blast of a horn behind her. They sail through the intersection. Eleven's eyes shoot forward, briefly meeting Joyce's in the rearview, before they both look away.

A few minutes later, she's barely reached to put the car in park on the driveway when El flings herself out of the backseat and slams the door. Joyce doesn't watch her stalk into the house. With shaking fingers, she kills the engine, and keys drop with a clatter onto the floor of her car.

Then, silence. For just a second.

Will, still sitting beside her, calls out gently. "Mom…?"

Joyce tells him to leave. She thinks she does anyway. She doesn't actually register the words leaving her mouth, but the next thing Will does is grab the strap of his backpack sitting between his feet and softly, hesitantly push open the passenger door. And then he's gone, climbing the front stoop to disappear into the house.

Joyce is alone for the first time all day with nowhere to be.

She wrings her hands around the steering wheel again and again, just to know she can still feel them. She thinks she is going numb. All that remains is the pounding in her head and the tightness in her chest and ache at the back of her throat.

An hour ago, Joyce had been at the precipice of this moment. Work was busy. They've been understaffed lately. The store was loud, and Joyce seemed hyper-aware of it all, tuned in to every voice, every squeal of an old shopping-cart wheel, every heavy footstep or ding of the door. And since she woke up late and had to rush out of the house, forgetting her cigarettes, she hadn't had the chance to smoke all day, which wasn't helping the edge gradually growing sharper.

She felt herself sliding off the brink in the moments before her manager grabbed her by the shoulder, a move that stunned her out of panic long enough to process the information she was being told. "The secretary from the high school is on hold in the back, Joyce. Something about your girl." Suddenly, Joyce snapped right back into Mom-mode. Briefly, she could forget, for as long as it took to leave her shift a few minutes early and drive to the school at the end of classes, how close she had been to falling apart. For no good reason.

No good reason she could see before now, anyway.

Because now, Joyce has nothing to hide behind. Her breaths shorten as she continues to wrench her grip around and around, feeling the sting of blisters forming on her palms and fingers. The pang in her throat releases into the breach of tears, and Joyce lets her head drop.

"Fuck," she whispers, as a shudder rips through her body. " _Fuck_."

She feels like she is trying to breathe through a pool of sand. The air is heavy, suffocating, dry. Joyce reaches to roll down the window. Bird song greets her as it cracks open.

_I'm well aware of how difficult it is to adapt…_

Joyce glances out at the suburban road flanking her front yard, and for a second, it looks like somewhere she's never been before. She only recognizes as much as she can touch, and the rest of her head tells her she doesn't know what she is doing or where she is, because if she knew, she'd be making different choices. She'd be making everyone happier. She'd be keeping the promises she's made to her children a thousand times before that everything is going to get better.

Promised Jonathan when Lonnie left them.

Promised Will when he was lost.

Promised El when…

Well, when there was no other choice.

When having hope was the only way they were going to make it out of the cave.

Joyce feels like a failure. Joyce feels like a liar. Eleven is hurting and she doesn't know how to make it stop.

She doesn't know if it's even possible here, so far away from everything the girl has ever known.

Pressing her eyes shut, Joyce sinks her fingertips into her scalp and leans over the steering wheel. She tries to catch her breath, the air makes it halfway down her throat and she coughs it back up again, into the sleeve of her sweater.

Joyce is hurting too, for her own reasons.

There is this fear roiling her insides, that leaving Hawkins was a mistake.

There is an equally powerful and devastating certainty that staying behind would have destroyed her even quicker.

* * *

The house is still when Joyce finally steps inside, thoughtlessly kicking off her sneakers and hanging her purse on the hook by the front door. She's used to coming home to the sound of music faintly raining down from the upper level, where Will does his homework sitting on his bedroom floor. Right now, however, Joyce is greeted by silence. She thinks a voice may shatter the air.

Light, cautious steps carry her up the stairs, and when Joyce pauses before Eleven's door, the quiet persists. No sobs or sniffles. No murmured words spoken on a phone call to Hawkins. El contacts either Mike or Max almost every day as soon as she comes home from school. Today, Joyce presses her ear against a locked bedroom door and is left only to imagine a girl on the other side utterly alone with her thoughts.

Joyce sighs and retreats to her own room where the waxy remains of her mascara are scrubbed off of her eyelids and cheeks, and her untidy ponytail is pulled free to fan out across her shoulders. Joyce stares at her reflection in the mirror, wipes some dust away with her sleeve, holds her own tired, watery gaze as she plucks a cigarette from the pack sitting on the dresser, presses it between her teeth and ignites it. Her first drag is long and slow. She holds it in her lungs until she coughs it back out, tendrils of smoke obscuring the view of her splotchy pale skin. Joyce backs away. She falls onto her bed. She holds the cigarette between her eyes and watches it burn, staring at that rim of orange light circling ash.

It reminds her of something.

It reminds her of the red-hot glow of another world burning from behind a scar in space.

A wound forcibly stitched shut, still pulsing with energy.

A deceiving light meant to fool one into thinking that more than decay and darkness and evil rests on the other side.

A gate that she closed.

Softly, a laugh bubbles out from Joyce's throat. She takes another drag and laughs again, smoke curling into the air with its sound, that bitter, cheerless sound.

That's right. She closed the gate. She turned a pair of keys and sealed the gaping hole ripped into the fabric of reality. She killed the Mind Flayer. She saved her family and Hawkins and maybe even the whole fucking world or something.

Isn't that what she's supposed to think?

Eyes on the ceiling, Joyce's laughter fades. She remembers how Jonathan and Will described it the day after, how standing on Starcourt Mall's upper level, they watched the Mind Flayer seize, stumble, crash, and collapse with an agonized roar, like an animal that had been shot. Lifeless it lay, frozen limbs the width of tree trunks made of melted human remains, smelling like burning flesh, blood, and bleach. They mentioned how weird it felt to see it dead, to see it silent and motionless, rather than a storm of shadow taking back to the sky after they burned it out of Will's body. "It felt…final," Jonathan murmured, exhibiting a cautious optimism Joyce suspected was only meant to comfort her.

She never got to witness the abomination herself. She didn't get to see it die. And even if her boys believed their own words, Joyce didn't. That morning of July 5, 1985, she sat at the kitchen table with a cigarette between a pair of quivering fingers and listened as her boys called her a hero.

They thought that was what she needed to hear. For all Joyce could tell, they were right. Twelve hours had passed, and she was already starting to forget that it wasn't all for nothing.

But that word – "hero" – made her want to throw up.

"Bullshit," she murmurs through an acrid smirk. What kind of hero is she? The kind to get tossed aside like a ragdoll by a big Russian psychopath, not even worth the dignity of punch to the teeth. The kind to come to her senses with only enough time for it to sink in that there _wasn't enough time_ to save _him_ , her dearest friend. The kind to stare him in the face between bolts of electricity flinging themselves through the air and lock him in his fate with the twist of her hands.

Hands that could never give in return for all that he gave her.

Sure. By definition, maybe, Joyce is a hero. She shares that label in secret with every other person who contributed to the defeat of the Mind Flayer and the destruction of that horrid mall. But she always thought heroes are meant to sacrifice themselves. Not the people they love. Joyce would rather not be a hero at all, because selfishly, she wishes she could have it all. She knows the pain of loss, and one way or another, however this ended, somebody has to feel it because of her.

Joyce hasn't downed any more than half a mug of black coffee today, and she's starting to feel nauseous. Turning onto her side, she sticks the cigarette between her lips and watches to make sure the bedspread doesn't catch fire as she cushions her head on the crook of her elbow. It isn't quite 4 PM, and by now, Joyce is too exhausted to spare any more tears. Her breaths come long and slow, in and out through her mouth, and with every exhale, she keeps a senseless hope that she could expel her tumultuous thoughts along with the smoke, as if she is burning them out of her head. Yet, on and on they spiral, out of reach of any fire she could try to cast against them. Joyce sighs as she rises to tap her ashes into the tray on the bedside table, running a hand through her bangs, which are getting too long.

And then there is this noise.

She doesn't notice it at first. It's just low enough that even as she hears it humming on the other side of the wall, she can't quite register that the house's uncharacteristic silence has been finally broken. Joyce is just about to lay back down when she pauses halfway against the mattress, wondering at first if it's a sound trilling from the back of her head.

No. A moment elapses, and Joyce recognizes exactly what it is. Radio static. And on the other side of the wall she's facing is El's room.

El. She's trying to focus. She's trying to access the void of her mind. Use her powers.

It would be the second time today at least, but Joyce had assumed the attack on Phillip was a spur of the moment reaction, totally unplanned, totally emotional, and more importantly, unsuccessful, requiring the intervention of typical, un-superpowered violence. But now El, deliberately, and after nearly a half hour of otherwise soundless contemplation, reached for the radio sitting on the top of the dresser Joyce thrifted upon moving into town and created the environment necessary to see and hear across miles.

Joyce drops her cigarette in the ashtray.

Walking on her toes up against the wall, she draws in a breath to hold.

_Please. Something. Anything._

For two hours, Joyce listens.

For two hours, there is nothing.

* * *

"Sweetie?"

At 8:15 that night, Joyce holds a plate of pizza in front of Eleven's bedroom door, gently rapping her knuckles at eye level. She didn't come down for dinner, and as long as El has been under Joyce's care, she's never deliberately skipped a meal.

"I brought up food. Extra pepperoni. Your favorite."

She gets no response. Joyce's stomach twists in a knot and she leans her forehead against the door.

"El, come on, honey, we gotta talk."

"No."

She's grateful for the voice at least. Joyce sighs. "What is this about? School, Phillip, your powers, what? I'll understand. I promise I will."

 _Promise_. The word gets halfway lodged in her throat and the rest of the sentence barely makes it past her lips. Joyce coughs.

"Powers?" Eleven's voice answers weakly, but she sounds closer now. "Did you hear?"

"Not much," Joyce murmurs.

Slowly, the doorknob turns. Joyce steps back a pace as Eleven appears, already dressed in her pajamas with her hair tied back in a scrunchie. The first thing she does is take the pizza, lifting the first slice to her mouth with little hesitation. She sizes Joyce up for a moment while she chews, the reluctance in her face wavering a bit like a flag in the wind.

And then it falls. She steps aside to let Joyce pass, and the older woman takes a seat on the bed, sweeping her eyes around the little bedroom as she patiently waits for Eleven to finish the pizza. The radio sits in the middle of the floor, and Joyce notices how much dustier the rest of El's dresser is than the spotless space where the radio is usually kept. With a glance at the wastebin beneath the desk, Joyce finds a number of discarded tissues, a couple bright dabs of blood clearly visible. Her heart jumps up to her throat, but she says nothing. She wants El to be ready to speak first.

It doesn't take very long for El to eat. She pulls another tissue from the box on the desk to wipe her mouth, and it is clear by the way she withholds it for a moment before dropping it into the wastebin that she knows Joyce has seen the result of her efforts and sits on the bed waiting to know more.

"Joyce…" she whispers.

"Yes?"

"Sorry about today."

Joyce's heart breaks a little. She orients her body towards El, giving a faint shake of her head. "Sweetie, I – I can't say I don't understand. You know, I appreciate that you want to defend Will, be there for him. I'm _relieved_ that the two of you have been such a source of support for each other –"

"I shouldn't have pushed Phillip," El mumbles.

"No," Joyce agrees solemnly, and her eyes drop to the floor. "You were angry."

Eleven pulls at the hair-ties around her wrist, sighing through her nose. She sits a minute in silence and then whispers, "I don't want to feel this way anymore."

"I know, El."

"I just –" Her gaze flicks up, reaching Joyce's halfway across the room with a flash of apprehension. The rest of her sentence is cautious as it rolls out like tires inching up against a curb stop. "I wish things could go back to the way they used to be."

Joyce opens her mouth to reply but yields no more than a short exhale. The words she thinks El wants to hear – a sympathetic "I know, Sweetie, so do I" – stall and then disintegrate at the back of her tongue, destroyed by the simple fact that they are not the truth. Joyce isn't really sure anymore what _the way things used to be_ even means. June 1985 was the last time she could claim to feel even halfway normal, but Joyce's normal ever since meeting Eleven can only be described as fleeting intervals between the world's falling apart at its seams. Her normal before was – well, it was better than that, as long as a nasty divorce and preceding catastrophic marriage can be considered better. Joyce chews on her bottom lip, tracing the floral pattern of the rug beneath Eleven's bed with her toe. For her, _the way things used to be_ must refer to the way things have never been: the way everyone made it out of that mall alive; the way they all went home with their families that night; the way Joyce had plans to look forward to that following Friday; the way maybe, just maybe, she'd realize that if she left Hawkins, she'd be leaving behind the one person who saw her pain as it was reflected inside of him, the one person who understood her that she didn't have to be strong for.

Yes, Joyce misses that. All those things that never happened.

But she knows it's different for El. Her life is shorter and her world is smaller and she grieves for more than hypotheticals. Joyce blinks up at the teenaged girl, who looks rather nervous that she has said something wrong, and tells her, "I'm so sorry, Eleven."

"Sorry?"

"That it's been so hard. All of it – school, making friends, moving here, losing your powers, losing…" Joyce trails off and wipes her eyes with her thumbs. "You know, I want nothing more than to make it easier for you, but I don't know how, and I'm so sorry. Because I should know."

"Joyce." El stands up. She picks a pillow up off her chair and hugs it to her chest as she moves to sit on the bed beside her. "Don't be sad. It's not your fault."

It is Joyce's fault. Joyce is the reason El had to leave Hawkins. Joyce is the reason her dad is gone.

"I – I know," she says thinly. "I just want you to be happy."

El's eyes fall closed as she leans into Joyce, softening beneath the arm that readily wraps around her. Joyce sighs. She withholds her tears as best she can.

"You're good," El tells her. "You're a good… _mother_."

That word comes out strange, as if El is trying to mean it impersonally; yet as she speaks, she holds the pillow firmer and buries her face into Joyce's shoulder. Caught off guard, Joyce takes a sharp inhale, air lashing like whip down her windpipe.

The only thing she can think to say is, "You're a good…daughter."

It is no less awkwardly stated, but with the weight of sincerity all the same. They remain sitting this way for half a minute longer, and all the while Joyce clings to a sounder judgment than the voice in her head suggesting this moment is unearned.

When Eleven does lift her head and opens her teary brown eyes, Joyce's gaze returns to the wastebin, to the blots of scarlet that hadn't quite been folded into hiding. "Were you…successful?"

El looks away. She runs her fingertips along the edges of the pillow on her lap, sniffling.

"You were in there for a while."

"Yeah…"

"Everything okay?"

Setting the pillow aside, El gets off her bed and goes to return the radio to its usual place. She stares at it for a moment. She grips it hard and then releases it, spreading her fingers across the dusty surface of the dresser. "I feel like I'm getting close," she whispers.

"You do?"

"Something is happening." Without removing her gaze from the radio, El gestures to the wastebin. "Got that far."

"It's not so good if you're bleeding with no real results, though, huh?" Joyce asks.

"There are…results." _Results_ sounds like _mother_.

"What are they? – if – if , you know, you don't mind me asking," Joyce stutters.

"Shapes," El says. "I can't see people. Just shapes."

"Like – silhouettes?"

"You know how when you stare at something bright, and then you can still see the shape of it, even after you look away?"

"Yeah."

"It's like that, but stronger," explains El. She turns around and leans against the dresser, looking warily at Joyce. "I can't really make out a face, or exact colors, but there's something. Barely, but it's there."

"How long did it take you to see that?"

El folds her arms. "A while."

"Did you hear anything?"

"No one was speaking. I mean, I don't think they were speaking."

"More than one?"

El blinks. Hard. "One."

"Are you going to keep practicing?" Joyce asks.

"Not tonight. I'm tired."

"You don't want to push it."

"Uh huh." Eleven takes a deep breath, and then, gingerly, she walks to her desk and hands the empty plate over to Joyce. "Thank you for bringing this."

"Of course."

"I should do my homework."

This is Joyce's queue to leave. She offers a soft smile and rises from the bed, although there is a particular unsettled manner about Eleven now, something that their several minutes of interaction had not alleviated, which keeps her hanging in the doorway an extra second, casting a final glance back into the room. Eleven stands in the center of the floor. Her countenance is tight and nervous as she picks at her fingernails, eyes fixed, not on the textbook that sits open on the desk, but on the radio.

"Will you be okay?" Joyce wonders. She doesn't want to overstay her welcome, but these days she can't bring herself to ignore strange behavior.

Eleven turns her head, and her lip trembles as she gazes at the woman positioned with one hand lingering on the doorknob, eyes lingering on a room swollen with words still left unsaid. "Yeah."

"You sure?"

"I'm fine. It's just…" El's voice trembles as she whispers, "I-I need to tell you something."

Joyce doesn't skip a beat. She walks back into the room, closing the door behind her this time. "What is it?"

"I don't know if you'll believe me."

That is quite possibly one of the most baffling things Joyce could ever have said to her. She tries to offer a smile of assurance, taking Eleven gently by the shoulder. "Oh, gosh, Sweetie, if anyone is going to believe you…"

"I know, but –" A tear runs down Eleven's cheek. She holds still as Joyce wipes it away. "But this – but _you_ –"

"Eleven, please, don't worry about it, okay?" Joyce takes the girl's hands between her own. "Say what needs to be said. I'll listen. I'm here for you." _I've got to be._

There is a pause.

El blurts out, "It's Hopper."

"…oh." Joyce's heart sinks a little, but she suppresses the urge of her face to fall and tries to maintain her smile, even if it is sadder. "Eleven…"

"Joyce."

"I know. It's alright." Joyce moves to pull Eleven into a hug, but to her alarm, she is practically shoved away. Eleven's fingers drill into her shoulders, and Joyce tenses into shock-stillness as the girl leans closer.

" _No_ ," Eleven says. That severe expression of hers, it's the same one she wears when she uses her powers, all focus and determination and something older than her fourteen years should allow. "I don't mean I miss him. I mean – I mean he's –"

Her grasp loosens. She pinches her eyes closed.

"I mean I think he's _alive_."

Joyce's throat turns to sandpaper in a second. A quiet, strangled, "What?" rasps out.

Eleven grabs the radio once again to hand to Joyce, who isn't ready to take it. It nearly fumbles out of her arms onto the floor. "I looked for him. Those shapes. Him."

Joyce is shaking her head. "I – I don't –"

"I know it was him. I was _looking_ for him. I wouldn't have seen anything if he wasn't out there."

"Eleven, slow down."

A burning gaze shoots into Joyce's face as she stares at the radio, trying to think over the roar of her accelerating pulse in her ears. The feeling begins to slowly seep out of her body from head to toe. The radio is shaking. It's because her hands are shaking. And then she wonders if she'll be able to hold herself on her legs for much longer.

"Are…are you sure?"

El takes Joyce's forearm. "I want you to believe me."

"I – do." She's got to believe her, right? Joyce wouldn't feel like she is floating halfway out of her own body if she doesn't believe what El is telling her. "I just have questions."

"What?" El murmurs.

"Why did you start looking for Hopper?" The words tumble out clumsily, as if Joyce's mouth is filled with cotton.

"I was having dreams."

"Dreams?"

"Dreams about him." Eleven's grip tightens. Joyce barely feels it. "Dreams where he's alive and in trouble."

"El, those are just dreams."

"But my powers are coming back."

"What you saw, that could have been anyone."

" _No_. You know how it works. I was looking for Hopper, Joyce. For _Hopper_."

"You hallucinated. You saw shapes. You were in there for a really long time and you started to picture things in your head."

Eleven looks wounded for a moment, and then she seems to notice that the color has drained out of Joyce's face. She drags her desk chair into the center of the room and makes Joyce sit. Then, bending over to stare sharply into her eyes, she insists, "I know what I saw. You know what I saw. You're denying it."

"Sweetie," Joyce exhales. She heaves the radio off her lap and drops it between her feet. Somehow, the thing seems to weigh fifty pounds. "I'm so sorry. I know how badly you miss him. But your dad, he's – he's gone."

"But what if he's not?" El challenges.

"No, no. You don't understand. I was there. I turned the keys. I watched him –" Joyce's voice breaks off like it has hit a brick wall. All at once, she realizes the rest of her sentence would not be true. It is part of the narrative she has been telling herself for the last eight months, and only now she finds that something about it isn't quite right.

"I…I closed my eyes," she continues at last. I closed my eyes. "I turned the keys. I opened my eyes, and he was – El, baby, he was gone."

"But what if he wasn't?" El retorts again. She points at herself. "Me. Remember me? Everyone thought I was gone."

"El."

"I was in the Upside Down. What if Hop is in the Upside Down? What if we can still save him?"

"Oh, God." Joyce buries her face in her hands.

"Joyce, please. You do believe me," murmurs El.

They've all witnessed too many impossible things to be skeptics. And _Joyce_ , Joyce of all people in the world is the very last who should be trying to tell Eleven that she is mistaken. If Hopper himself could speak to them now, he should be only the second to vouch for his daughter, after the woman whose child vanished into thin air, spoke to her through flickering Christmas lights, and sits in his bedroom as they speak, alive and perfectly well. Will must be hearing the whole exchange. He must be believing it too.

Joyce knows how it feels to be called crazy. She knows it feels the worst when you've never been more certain of anything in your entire life, the way she was about Will being alive, just out of her reach, just beyond the scope of the rest of the world to see she was right all along. She doesn't wish that kind of helpless, paralyzing isolation on anyone, and certainly not on El. Certainly not in the face of hope flickering to life in her eyes for the first time in months.

"I was scared," Eleven goes on, "today, when I couldn't use my powers on Phillip. I – I know it was wrong anyway, but I was scared that I wouldn't be able to get this far." From between the fingers stretched over her eyes, Joyce watches El kneel on the floor and take the radio. The girl heaves a deep sigh. "I'm going to keep looking for him. I know he's out there. One day, I'll be able to see where, and maybe I'll be able to hear him too, and we can – we can help him. We'll bring him back."

"I'm sorry," whispers Joyce hoarsely. El glances up, putting a hand on Joyce's knee. "I'm scared too."

"I know."

Joyce strains to reach for the tissues on the desk and pulls one from the box to dry her eyes. What she feels now, it's the total opposite of what she felt earlier today in Principal Crossley's office and in the car sitting on the driveway. Instead of drawing everything towards her like a force of gravity, Joyce feels herself unraveling, a million loose threads being plucked in every possible direction, becoming less and less of herself second by second. As much as she believes El (so much that it stings), it is not with the active, desperate blaze of urgency that used to ravage her soul at the first sign of something out of order. For once, Joyce freezes at the icy grip of fear clutching her in its claws, pulling her apart. She does not know how to fight it the way she used to. Suddenly, she is more terrified of what will happen, how it will feel, if she loses.

Hopper died. Even if he is still alive out there somewhere, to Joyce and to El and to everyone else, he died that Fourth of July night. They'd made it back to the house in the early hours of the morning – after enduring the first of many painstaking conversations with Dr. Owens in which Joyce had to recount, in excruciating detail, a story climaxing with the loss of her best friend – and when Eleven curled up on the other side of Joyce's bed to cry herself to sleep, Joyce had gone to the phone. She made it halfway. Then she'd paused in the middle of the hallway because she remembered she had no one to call.

She must have stood there immobile for an hour at least, just staring.

Hopper, the one person Joyce could talk to about this, the one person who could understand her pain in the way she needed it to be understood, was the one whose loss had hurt her.

It was like searching for the antidote to a poison in the poison itself.

How was she supposed to support Eleven through this? How was _she_ going to make it through this? Hopper was the one they both needed the most and he was gone.

That early morning, as the horizon was stained with the pinks and purples of dawn, Joyce felt more alone than ever before.

She gazes at Eleven now, balling the tissue in her fist and trying to calm herself down. She shouldn't feel so full of dread. At this glimmer of hope, Joyce should be overcome with a rush of relief or a flare of joy, but as much as she is dying to feel whole again, she can't stop herself from wondering if their luck has to run dry eventually. She almost lost her son twice. She almost lost her town. But after all the shit she's been put through, maybe the universe has still been too kind to her. Maybe this is the cruelest kindness of all, the sort that can be taken away the moment she believes in it hard enough.

Joyce aches for Hopper. For his strong, gentle embrace, and his earnest blue gaze, and the taste of his cigarettes, and the way he makes her feel _not alone_. And if she could see those shapes in the dark like Eleven, then maybe she'd even begin to know it all over again.

But she doesn't know if she could survive losing him a second time.

She doesn't know if she could live with a hope so dangerously close to burning out.

If the last eight months have taught Joyce anything, it is that she has her limits.

But she does not say any of this. After the passage of many silent minutes, Joyce knits her brows together in an expression she hopes is fiery and bright and encouraging and sets her hand on top of Eleven's.

She has promised to make things better.

She has no intention of breaking that promise.

"Take care of yourself," Joyce tells El. "Don't overdo it, but you practice, and you find him, and when you do…" _I hope you do_. "We are going to bring him home."

Eleven smiles.

"Home."

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Leave a comment, I'd really appreciate it. Have a good one!


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